Recycling Totals 2010

Glass

Plastic

Aluminum

Cardboard

Paper

Wood

Total

120

7,720

380

28,880

9,480

15,280

61,860

Stats:

• 380 lbs of aluminum is equal to about 12,998 individual cans of soda.
• 38,360 lbs of recycled paper and cardboard saves 326 trees.
• 228 cubic yards of landfill space would have been needed to dispose of this material.
• You can also look at the energy equivalents of these materials as 129 barrels of oil.

You can add to these numbers 1,517 4-foot fluorescent tube lights, recycled through the LampTracker program at Waste Management.

Arbor Day, the day we celebrate trees, is a U.S. holiday officially observed in Ohio (and 18 other states) on the last Friday in April, but it is celebrated in other states and countries on dates better suited for those regions growing seasons.

The whole idea of Arbor Day is to educate the public on the benefits of trees and to encourage tree planting. Why plant trees, you ask:

• Tree roots hold soil in place. This reduces erosion and runoff.
• Trees remove CO2 (carbon dioxide) from the air, store it, and release oxygen back into the air. They also remove other greenhouse gases, pollutants, and particulates from the air.
• Trees provide food for humans and wildlife and habitats for many organisms.
• Trees planted close to a home or office building can dramatically cut cooling costs.
• Trees break up urban heat islands and can cool a city by 10 degrees Fahrenheit.

There are plenty of other perfectly good reasons to plant a tree or lots of trees if you wish. Visit these links to learn more about why trees are so important to our health and the health of our planet.
www.treelink.org/docs/29_reasons.phtml
www.treelink.org/linx/factoid.php

So far this year BilJax has recycled over 22,000 pounds of material. It would have taken 114 cubic yards of landfill space to contain it as municipal solid waste. Thank goodness we avoided that!

BilJax has replaced its bottled water coolers with bottleless water coolers. Instead of having water hauled from 12 miles away in 40 pound 5 gallon polycarbonate jugs, the facility now uses a point of source system. Water that is already supplied to the building is filtered and drank. There are a few other good reasons to make the switch:

• There is no risk of injury to the person who has to lift the 40 pound bottle of water to replace the empty ones.
• No more adding to CO2 emissions shipping full and empty water jugs around the area.
• UV lights inside the units kill any bacteria that make its way inside. 
• The cost of 5 gallons of bottled water is comparable to about 1,000 gallons from onsite water lines. That includes the sewer fees.

Why filtered and not reverse osmosis? We did not choose reverse osmosis units because about 3 gallons of water are lost as waste water for every gallon of water it produces for consumption. Because a major part of the switch was an environmental influence, reverse osmosis was not going to work for us. Most large water suppliers of reverse osmosis bottled water use a recovery system that reclaims some of that waste water until they achieve about 90% or better efficiency. Unfortunately that is not the case for a small unit where the ratio is 3:1.

The potential problem with the  polycarbonate container is the concern that the bisphenol A or BPA may leech into the water. Who knows how long the water jugs sit at the factory before they get shipped to your facility or how hot they get in the truck on the ride over. These factors may influence if and how much chemical is leeched into your bottled drinking water.

Paper

Aluminum

Plastic

Cardboard

Glass

Total

13,216

636

9,552

45,426

6,646

75,476

BilJax recycled 75,476 lbs or 37.7 tons of material instead of sending it to landfill as municipal solid waste. You can add to that another 4,278 lbs collected during the electronic waste recycling event last October.

Stats:

• 636 lbs of aluminum is equal to about 21,758 individual cans of soda.
• 58,642 lbs of recycled paper and cardboard saves 499 trees.
• 325 cubic feet of landfill space would have been needed to dispose of this material.
• You can also look at the energy equivalents of these materials as 176 barrels of oil.

Any volunteer group who wishes to get involved in an Adopt A Highway program should contact their local Department of Transportation.  Additional program information and program contacts can be found at www.dot.state.oh.us.